Do you read obits?

This question appeared in the “Ask Marilyn” column of Parade: “My husband and daughter read the obituaries daily, which I find strange. Why do some people like to do this?”

I’m not sure why I read them. I could say as Christians we should celebrate everyone’s resurrection. But maybe it’s just an occupational hazard—journalists are taught to respect obituaries because it’s usually the last thing written about a person. And that “last thing” can be fascinating. Like Vernon Carter, a Lutheran pastor who in 1965 led a 114-day vigil to fight segregation in Boston schools. That “last thing” can be funny too. When I was a newspaper copy editor, a family wanted their beloved’s headline to read: John “Big Stick” Beaman dies. The joke in the newsroom: “His pallbearers walked softly and carried a ‘Big Stick.’ ” I still wonder about the story behind his nickname.

Marilyn asked her readers to respond. One said: “If I see a name of someone of whom I knew, I try to reach out to their family ....” Another wrote: “I read the obituaries almost as a sense of history—each person’s life story is a vignette of daily life. Especially interesting are the WWII vets—they were barely out of their teens and did incredible acts of selflessness and courage.”